Valentine’s Gift: Easy DIY Soap

I’ve always liked the idea of soap making but was put off by all of the nasty chemicals involved. It just sounded a bit dangerous. Recently though I’ve come across a simpler and safer way to make your own soap at home and it’s so easy you can even get the kids involved. You can now get a ready prepared ‘soap base’ and then add to it your choice of fragrance, colour and/or any exfoliating ingredients you like. With Valentine’s Day coming up I thought I’d try this new method out with a cute heart shaped mold I’ve just picked up. Here’s how you do it:

The soap base comes in big slabs so you’ll need to estimate how much you need for the mold you have chosen and chop up that amount into a microwavable container. I used an old takeaway tub as I wasn’t sure what sort of mess it would be in afterwards but it washed out fine. You could use a double boiler method like you would for chocolate if you don’t want to use a microwave.

Melt the base slowly without over heating, stirring occasionally. The hotter you make it the longer you’ll have to work with it before it solidifies again but obviously if you are doing it with the kids then you are better off making it less hot and just working a bit quicker.

Once it has become a clear liquid you can add whatever you like in terms of colour, fragrance etc. I’ve added a lemon fragrance and yellow colour as well as some freshly grated lemon zest and a little juice. If you are buying supplies make sure they are suitable to be used in soap. Candle making supplies for example will probably not be suitable and food colourings might stain your skin. Natural ingredients are a good bet, fruit zest or flower petals for example. Next time I think I might try vanilla fragrance with some ground almonds for a bit of exfoliation.

Pour the mixture into your chosen mold. Silicone ones will be the easiest to pop them out of and you can use bakeware or candle molds as well as ones made specifically for soap. Leave it to cool and solidify completely before turning it out and gifting it to your Valentine.

I got all my supplies on line. You can find everything you need somewhere like Amazon or in hobby stores and they are pretty inexpensive particularly as one little bottle of fragrance or colour will be enough for dozens of bars of soap. I was really surprised how straight forward it turned out to be and the endless combinations of ingredients you could use so it’s definitely something we’ll be doing again. Why don’t you give it a try?

Cat is a Mum to two young boys and can normally be found blogging about family and food over at Yellow Days. She’s also an avid Pinner, enjoys sharing on twitter and is a new convert to Google+ so do pop by and say Hi.

Recently I have made my own antibacterial soap, as antibacterial soaps work better than other soaps and kill more germs. But now after reading your post, I also want to make this one as your gift idea sounds very cool and interesting. So I will definitely try this.

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